Thursday June 12, 2008

Star Wars Holiday Special - I Can't Believe They Tried This

It may be Summer time but we can all dream of Christmas, snow, Carrie Fisher, and Star Wars. In 1978 someone decided that it would be a great idea to create a Star Wars Holiday Special with some of the original cast and crew of the early films including some notable cameo appearances such as Jefferson Starship.

According to Wikipedia’s entry, The Star Wars Holiday Special:

The Star Wars Holiday Special was a two-hour television special (including commercials) set in the Star Wars galaxy. It was the first official Star Wars spinoff produced. It was broadcast in its entirety in the United States only once on Friday, November 17, 1978 on CBS-TV from 8:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m., Eastern Standard Time (EST). The show has never been broadcast in the United Kingdom. In it, Chewbacca and Han Solo visit Kashyyyk, Chewbacca’s home world, to celebrate Life Day. Along the way, they are pursued by agents of the Galactic Empire who are searching for rebels on the planet. The special introduces three members of Chewbacca’s family: his father Attichitcuk, his wife Mallatobuck, and his son Lumpawarrump.

The main storyline of the film, which is set in 2 ABY, transpires on Kashyyyk. During the film, scenes also take place in outer space and in spacecraft including the Millennium Falcon and an Imperial Star Destroyer. The variety-show segments and cartoon introduce a few other locales, such as a cantina on the desert planet of Tatooine and a gooey, reddish water planet known as Panna.